THE STAMP DUTIES BILL.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4499, 21 August 1875, Page 2

THE STAMP DUTIES BILL.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE MEW ZEAXAXD TIMES.

Sir,— Tlio gentleman who assumed the name and oflice of " Censor" in a letter which you published on Thursday last, does not appear to be aware that almost every section to the wording or meaning of which he takes exception has been copied verbatim, or nearly so, from the English Stamp Act and Stamp Management Act of IS7O, and that those Acts are justly considered to bo admirable specimens of the work of some of the ablest Bill drafters of the present day. Whether those gentlemen are without "the slightest practical business experience in this branch of a solicitor's profession,*' may be left to the opinion of tho public. I will only say that the language of these sections has not been held by English courts of law to present any difficulty in their interpretation, or to occasion any such grievances as "Censor" apprehends. He is wrong in supposing that tho appellant in England is required to make a deposit to meet tho cost of appeal. The deposit of 40s. formerly required is repealed. He is wrong in supposing that appointments to offices can be made by agreement. If ho had carefully read the Bill, he would have seen that such appointments are rendered invalid. Whether proceedings in bankruptcy should be free from stamp duty, is a matter of opinion. At present they are not so altogether. Tho same with friendly societies. These are matters of policy, and have nothing to do with the structure of the Bill. If the committee prefers to add these or other matters to the table of exceptions, it can do so in a word. Again, this gentleman speaks of " the happily unusual course adopted, of using the present instead of tho future tenso throughout the Bill." Ho seems wholly ignorant of the extent to which this simple, intelligible, and vigorous form of sentence has been imported into the best English statutes of the present day; and that it was a common form in old statutes. The Stamp Acts teem with examples. He has probably forgotten that tho Supreme Court and Court of Appeal and the Privy Council not long ago were occupied in trying to give a meaning to the language of a colonial draftsman, who had so entangled himself with shalls, shall-haves, and shall-have-beens, as to obscure all sense of past, present, and future. One word in the present tense would have saved all that litigation. But as I cannot accept "Censor "as a guide in law, he must forgive mo if I have an equal mistrust in his views of grammar, at least when I read the following sentence;—"The section runs: Any dissatisfied person may require Commissioner to state a case, and the Commissioner shall thereon comply, although ho may bo perfectly satisfied that the person is some worthless fellow whose only objection is being obliged to pay anything at all, and who does not for one instant seriously contemplate prosecuting the appeal." I have looked carefully through the Bill, and I confess I am unabla to find tho section which ' runs as above. , „, ■ , . . One word In conclusion. If "Censor 1 desired to make an attack on Mr. Govett, that is a matter in which he may please himself; but unless he knew that that gentleman drafted the Bill, it was scarcely honest to write as if the inexperience of the assisted law officer was tho cause of its imperfections. Mr. Govett has, at all events, never exhibited himself to the world as laying down the law in a matter of which" he was ignorant, or of constructing such a sentence as that which I have quoted.—l am. &c, Recensor.